Bruce Highway receives $46.7 million upgrades

Projects will update eight intersection on the Bruce Highway in Queensland.

Construction is set to begin on four Bruce Highway upgrades in central Queensland worth $46.7 million.

As part of ongoing improvements on the freight route, the Queensland government has confirmed the next series of works will widen and reconstruct the road surface and update intersections along stretches of the highway between Rockhampton and Miriam Vale.

The biggest project, valued at $32 million, will upgrade the highway from Bajool to Midgee, south of Rockhampton.

The Bruce Highway’s intersection with South Ulam Road in Bajool will also be updated in a $2.8 million project.

Further south, a $6.7 million project will widen, reconstruct and upgrade intersections from Miriam Vale to Bororen.

The fourth project will focus on the Bruce Highway north of Rockhampton, allocating $5.2 million for safety works and an intersection upgrade at Atkinson Road, Raspberry Creek Road and Kooltrandra Road.

The latest allocation of funds forms part of a promised $6.7 billion investment from the federal government from 2013 until 2023, which says the freight and tourism route needs a safety boost.

"The Bruce Highway is the economic backbone of many Queensland communities and our freight and tourism industries rely on it for their prosperity," federal member for Flynn Ken O’Dowd says.

The upgrades to the highway’s intersections will also be key, federal member for Capricornia Michelle Landry says.

"These projects are about improving safety and efficiency on the Bruce Highway – especially at rural dangerous intersections," she says.

"These works mean that turning vehicles will soon have their own lane while highway traffic can safely continue uninterrupted."

The new roads will feature the wide centre lines introduced in the state in 2010, which currently reside on 711km of the highway and according to the Queensland main roads and road safety minister Mark Bailey, reduce fatal and hospitalisation crashes where vehicles have crossed the centre line by 43 per cent.